Anti-nuclear movement in Germany - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The anti-nuclear movement in Germany has a long history dating back to the early 1970s, when large demonstrations prevented the construction of a nuclear plant at Wyhl

Wyhl

Wyhl is a municipality in the district of Emmendingen in Baden-Württemberg in southwestern Germany.It was known in the 1970s for its role in the anti-nuclear movement....

. The Whyl protests were an example of a local community challenging the nuclear industry through a strategy of direct action and civil disobedience. Police were accused of using unnecessarily violent means. Anti-nuclear

Anti-nuclear

The anti-nuclear movement is a social movement that opposes the use of nuclear technologies. Many direct action groups, environmental groups, and professional organisations have identified themselves with the movement at the local, national, and international level...

success at Wyhl inspired nuclear opposition throughout Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

, in other parts of Europe

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

, and in North America

North America

North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...

.

In 1986, large parts of Germany were covered with radioactive contamination

Radioactive contamination

Radioactive contamination, also called radiological contamination, is radioactive substances on surfaces, or within solids, liquids or gases , where their presence is unintended or undesirable, or the process giving rise to their presence in such places...

from the Chernobyl disaster

Chernobyl disaster

The Chernobyl disaster was a nuclear accident that occurred on 26 April 1986 at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine , which was under the direct jurisdiction of the central authorities in Moscow...

and Germans went to great lengths to deal with the contamination. Germany's anti-nuclear stance was strengthened. From the mid-1990s onwards, anti-nuclear protests were primarily directed against transports of radioactive waste

High-level radioactive waste management

High-level radioactive waste management concerns management and disposal of highly radioactive materials created during production of nuclear power and nuclear warheads. The technical issues in accomplishing this are daunting, due to the extremely long periods radioactive wastes remain deadly to...

called "castor" containers.

In September 2010, German government policy shifted back toward nuclear energy, and this generated some new anti-nuclear sentiment in Berlin and beyond. On September 18, 2010, tens of thousands of Germans surrounded Chancellor Angela Merkel’s office. In October 2010, tens of thousands of people protested in Munich. In November 2010, there were violent protests against a train carrying reprocessed nuclear waste.

Within days of the March 2011 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster

Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster

The is a series of equipment failures, nuclear meltdowns, and releases of radioactive materials at the Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant, following the Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami on 11 March 2011. The plant comprises six separate boiling water reactors originally designed by General Electric ,...

, large anti-nuclear protests occurred in Germany. Chancellor Angela Merkel promptly "imposed a three-month moratorium on previously announced extensions for Germany's existing nuclear power plants, while shutting seven of the 17 reactors that had been operating since 1981". Protests continued and, on 29 May 2011, Merkel's government announced that it would close all of its nuclear power plants by 2022.

Early years

German publications of the 1950s and 1960s contained criticism of some features of nuclear power including its safety. Nuclear waste disposal was widely recognized as a major problem, with concern publicly expressed as early as 1954. In 1964, one author went so far as to state "that the dangers and costs of the necessary final disposal of nuclear waste could possibly make it necessary to forego the development of nuclear energy".

In the early 1960s there was a proposal to build a nuclear power station in West Berlin, but the project was dropped in 1962. Another attempt to site a reactor in a major city was made in 1967, when BASF planned to build a nuclear power station on its ground at Ludwigshafen, to supply process steam. Eventually the project was withdrawn by BASF.

The tiny hamlet of Wyhl, located just outside of the Kaiserstuhl

Kaiserstuhl

The „Kaiserstuhl“ is a relatively low mountain range – a Mittelgebirge – with a maximal height of 556.6 m above sea level. It is of volcanic origin and located in the South West of Baden-Württemberg, Germany in the districts of Emmendingen and Breisgau-Hochschwarzwald...

wine-growing area in the southwestern corner of Germany, was first mentioned in 1971 as a possible site for a nuclear power

Nuclear power

Nuclear power is the use of sustained nuclear fission to generate heat and electricity. Nuclear power plants provide about 6% of the world's energy and 13–14% of the world's electricity, with the U.S., France, and Japan together accounting for about 50% of nuclear generated electricity...

station. In the years that followed, local opposition steadily mounted, but this had little impact on politicians and planners. Official permission for the plant was granted and earthworks began on 17 February 1975. On 18 February, local people spontaneously occupied the site and police removed them forcibly two days later. Television coverage of police dragging away farmers and their wives through the mud helped to turn nuclear power into a major national issue. The rough treatment was widely condemned and made the wine-growers, clergy, and others all the more determined. Some local police refused to take part in the action.

Subsequent support came from the nearby university town of Freiburg. On 23 February about 30,000 people re-occupied the Wyhl site and plans to remove them were abandoned by the state government in view of the large number involved and potential for more adverse publicity. On 21 March 1975, an administrative court withdrew the construction licence for the plant. The plant was never built and the land eventually became a nature reserve.

The Wyhl occupation generated extensive national debate. This initially centred on the state government's handling of the affair and associated police behaviour, but interest in nuclear issues was also stimulated. The Wyhl experience encouraged the formation of citizen action groups near other planned nuclear sites. Many other anti-nuclear groups formed elsewhere, in support of these local struggles, and some existing citizens' action groups widened their aims to include the nuclear issue. This is how the German anti-nuclear movement evolved. Anti-nuclear success at Wyhl also inspired nuclear opposition in the rest of Europe and North America.

Other protests

In 1976 and 1977, mass demonstrations took place at Kalkar

Kalkar

Kalkar is a municipality in the district of Kleve, in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located near the Rhine, approx. 10 km south-east of Cleves. The most famous building of Kalkar is its church St...

, the site of Germany's first FBR, and at Brokdorf

Brokdorf

Brokdorf is a municipality in the district of Steinburg, in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany.-Anti Nuclear protests:The Brokdorf Nuclear Power Plant is located in Brokdorf. During the building phase in the 70's and 80's there were violent protests of nuclear power by opponents...

, north of Hamburg. The circumstances at Brokdorf were similar to those at Wyhl, in that the behaviour of the police was again crucial:

The authorities had rushed through the licensing process, and police occupied the site hours before the first construction license was granted, in order to prevent a repetition of Wyhl. Demonstrators trying to enter the site a few days later got harsh treatment, and all this helped consolidate the population in opposition.

In February 1977 the Minister-President of Lower Saxony, Ernst Albrecht of the Christian Democratic Union, announced that the salt mines in Gorleben

Gorleben

Gorleben is a small municipality in the Gartow region of the Lüchow-Dannenberg district in the far north-east of Lower Saxony, Germany, a region also known as the Wendland....

would be utilised to store radioactive waste

Radioactive waste

Radioactive wastes are wastes that contain radioactive material. Radioactive wastes are usually by-products of nuclear power generation and other applications of nuclear fission or nuclear technology, such as research and medicine...

. New protests by the local population and opponents of nuclear power broke out and approximately 20,000 people attended the first large demonstration in Gorleben on March 12, 1977. Protests about Gorleben continued for several years and, in 1979, the prime minister declared that plans for a nuclear waste plant in Gorleben were “impossible to enforce for political reasons".

In 1980 an Enquete Commission of the Bundestag proposed "a paradigmatic
change in energy policy away from nuclear power". This contributed to a broad shift in German public opinion, the formation of the
Green Party, and its election to the German Bundestag in 1983.

In the early 1980s plans to build a nuclear fuel reprocessing plant in the Bavarian town of Wackersdorf

Wackersdorf

Wackersdorf is a municipality in the district of Schwandorf in Bavaria, Germany.-See also:*Anti-nuclear movement in Germany*Armin Weiss*Hildegard Breiner...

lead to major protests. In 1986, West German police were confronted by demonstrators armed with slingshots, crowbars and Molotov cocktail

Molotov cocktail

The Molotov cocktail, also known as the petrol bomb, gasoline bomb, Molotov bomb, fire bottle, fire bomb, or simply Molotov, is a generic name used for a variety of improvised incendiary weapons...

s at the site of a nuclear reprocessing plant in Wackersdorf

Wackersdorf

Wackersdorf is a municipality in the district of Schwandorf in Bavaria, Germany.-See also:*Anti-nuclear movement in Germany*Armin Weiss*Hildegard Breiner...

. The plans for the plant were abandoned in 1988. It still isn't clear whether protests or plant economics led to the decision.

In 1981, Germany's largest anti-nuclear demonstration took place to protest against the construction of the Brokdorf Nuclear Power Plant

Brokdorf Nuclear Power Plant

Brokdorf Nuclear Power Plant is close to the municipality of Brokdorf in Steinburg, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. It started in October 1986 by a first-of-its-kind joint venture between PreussenElektra and Hamburgische Electricitäts-Werke...

on the North Sea coast west of Hamburg. Some 100,000 people came face to face with 10,000 police officers. Twenty-one policemen were injured by demonstrators armed with gasoline bombs, sticks, stones and high-powered slingshots. The plant began operations in October 1986 and is scheduled to close in 2018.

Chernobyl disaster

The Chernobyl disaster

Chernobyl disaster

in 1986 was a pivotal event for Germany's anti-nuclear movement. After the radioactive fallout cloud covered large parts of the country, Germans went to great lengths to deal with the contamination. Contaminated crops were destroyed, firemen dressed in protective gear cleaned cars as they crossed the border from other countries, and sand in playground sandboxes was replaced.

Following Chernobyl, the Green Party

Alliance '90/The Greens

Alliance '90/The Greens is a green political party in Germany, formed from the merger of the German Green Party and Alliance 90 in 1993. Its leaders are Claudia Roth and Cem Özdemir...

strived "for the immediate shut-down of all nuclear facilities". The SPD pushed for a nuclear phase-out within ten years. Länder governments, municipalities, parties and trade unions explored the question of "whether the use of nuclear power technology was reasonable and sensible for the future".

In May 1986 clashes between anti-nuclear protesters and West German police became common. More than 400 people were injured in mid-May at the site of a nuclear-waste reprocessing plant being built near Wackersdorf. Police "used water cannons and dropped tear-gas grenades from helicopters to subdue protesters armed with slingshots, crowbars and Molotov cocktails".

More recent developments

Several advanced reactor designs in Germany were unsuccessful. Two fast breeder reactors were built, but both were closed in 1991 without the
larger ever having achieved criticality. The High Temperature Reactor THTR-300

THTR-300

The THTR-300 was a thorium high-temperature nuclear reactor rated at 300 MW electric . The German state of North Rhine Westphalia, in the Federal Republic of Germany, and Hochtemperatur-Kernkraftwerk GmbH financed the THTR-300’s construction. Operations started on the plant in Hamm-Uentrop,...

at Hamm-Uentrop, under construction since 1970, was started in 1983, but was shut down in September 1989.

The anti-nuclear protests were also a driving force of the green movement in Germany, from which the party the Greens

Alliance '90/The Greens

Alliance '90/The Greens is a green political party in Germany, formed from the merger of the German Green Party and Alliance 90 in 1993. Its leaders are Claudia Roth and Cem Özdemir...

evolved. When they first came to power in the Schröder administration

Gerhard Schröder

Gerhard Fritz Kurt Schröder is a German politician, and was Chancellor of Germany from 1998 to 2005. A member of the Social Democratic Party of Germany , he led a coalition government of the SPD and the Greens. Before becoming a full-time politician, he was a lawyer, and before becoming Chancellor...

of 1998 they achieved their major political goal for which they had fought for 20 years: abandoning nuclear energy in Germany.

From the mid-1990s onwards, anti-nuclear protests were primarily directed against transports of radioactive waste

High-level radioactive waste management

called "castor" containers. In 1996 there were sit-ins against the second castor consignment bringing nuclear waste from La Hague in France to Gorleben. In 1997 the third castor transport reached Gorleben despite the efforts of several thousand protesters.

In 2002, the "Act on the structured phase-out of the utilization of nuclear energy for the commercial generation of electricity" took effect, following a drawn-out political debate and lengthy negotiations with nuclear power plant operators. The act legislated for the shut-down of all German nuclear plants by 2021. The Stade Nuclear Power Plant

Stade Nuclear Power Plant

The Nuclear power station Stade operated from 1972 to 2003 in Bassenfleth close to the Schwinge-river mouth into the Elbe river. It was the first nuclear plant shut down after Germany's nuclear phase out legislation and is currently undergoing the decommissioning process .The station is located...

was the first one to go offline in November 2003, followed by the Obrigheim Nuclear Power Plant

Obrigheim Nuclear Power Plant

The shut down Nuclear power station Obrigheim lies in Obrigheim in Neckar-Odenwald-Kreis . It operated one pressurized water reactor unit.-History:-Planning:...

in 2005. Block-A of the Biblis Nuclear Power Plant

Biblis Nuclear Power Plant

The Biblis Nuclear Power Plant is in the South Hessian municipality of Biblis and consists of two units: unit A with a gross output of 1200 megawatts and unit B with a gross output of 1300 megawatts. Both units are pressurized water reactors...

is still provisionally scheduled to be shut down in 2008. Block-B is going back online after a year-long shutdown on December 13 or 14, 2007 and is scheduled to keep operating until 2009 or 2012.

In 2007, amid concerns that Russian energy supplies to western Europe may not be reliable, conservative politicians, including Chancellor Angela Merkel

Angela Merkel

Angela Dorothea Merkel is the current Chancellor of Germany . Merkel, elected to the Bundestag from Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, has been the chairwoman of the Christian Democratic Union since 2000, and chairwoman of the CDU-CSU parliamentary coalition from 2002 to 2005.From 2005 to 2009 she led a...

and Economics Minister Michael Glos

Michael Glos

Michael Glos is a German politician who served as Minister for Economics and Technology from November 22, 2005, until February 10, 2009....

, continued to question the decision to phase out nuclear power in Germany. WISE

World Information Service on Energy

The World Information Service on Energy is an anti-nuclear group founded in 1978 to be an information and networking center for citizens and organizations concerned about nuclear power, radioactive waste, radiation and sustainable energy issues...

along with other anti-nuclear movement groups contend that the climate problem can only be solved by the use of renewable forms of energy

Renewable energy commercialization

Renewable energy commercialization involves the deployment of three generations of renewable energy technologies dating back more than 100 years. First-generation technologies, which are already mature and economically competitive, include biomass, hydroelectricity, geothermal power and heat...

along with efficient and economical energy technologies

Efficient energy use

Efficient energy use, sometimes simply called energy efficiency, is the goal of efforts to reduce the amount of energy required to provide products and services. For example, insulating a home allows a building to use less heating and cooling energy to achieve and maintain a comfortable temperature...

.

In summer 2008, a cover of the German magazine Der Spiegel

Der Spiegel

Der Spiegel is a German weekly news magazine published in Hamburg. It is one of Europe's largest publications of its kind, with a weekly circulation of more than one million.-Overview:...

reads Atomkraft - Das unheimliche Comeback (Nuclear Power - Its eerie comeback). As a consequence the Germans anti-nuclear organisation .ausgestrahlt decides to coordinate the various anti-nuclear movements on their website leading to a more powerful protest. Anti-nuclear Monday evening walks become popular in various German cities.

In November 2008, a shipment of radioactive waste from German nuclear plants arrived at a storage site near Gorleben after being delayed by large protests from nuclear activists. More than 15,000 people took part in the protests which involved blocking trucks with sit-down demonstrations and blocking the route with tractors. The demonstrations were partly a response to conservative calls for a rethink of the planned phaseout of nuclear power stations.

In April 2009, activists blocked the entrance to controversial Neckarwestheim Nuclear Power Plant

Neckarwestheim Nuclear Power Plant

Neckarwestheim Nuclear Power Station is a nuclear power plant in Neckarwestheim, Germany. It is sometimes abbreviated GKN . It is operated by EnBW Kernkraft GmbH.-GKN 1:...

with an 8-metre wall. Their protest coincided with the annual meeting of the company that runs the plant, EnBW Energie Baden-Württemberg.

Also in April 2009 about 1,000 people demonstrated against nuclear power generation in the north-western city of Münster. Located southwest of Hamburg, Münster is surrounded by a nuclear waste dump at Ahaus, Germany's only uranium enrichment plant at Gronau and another such plant at Almelo in neighbouring Holland.

Nuclear power is expected to retain an important place in the German electricity supply market in the mid-term, despite the phase-out agreement and economic difficulties of several individual plants. Nuclear power will continue to provide about 25% of German electricity until at least 2010.

A convoy of 350 farm tractors and 50,000 protesters took part in an anti-nuclear rally in Berlin on September 5, 2009. The marchers demanded that Germany close all nuclear plants by 2020 and close the Gorleben radioactive dump. Gorleben is the focus of the anti-nuclear movement, which has tried to derail train transports of waste and to destroy or block the approach roads to the site. Two above-ground storage units house 3,500 containers of radioactive sludge and thousands of tonnes of spent fuel rods.

On April 24, 2010, about 120,000 people built a human chain (KETTENreAKTION!) between the nuclear plants Krümmel

Krümmel Nuclear Power Plant

Krümmel Nuclear Power Plant is a nuclear power plant in Geesthacht near Hamburg, Germany. It was taken into operation in 1983 and is owned 50% by Vattenfall via Vattenfall Europe Nuclear Energy GmbH and 50% by E.ON, and operated by the Swedish Vattenfall...

and Brunsbüttel

Brunsbüttel Nuclear Power Plant

Brunsbüttel Nuclear Power Plant is a nuclear power plant in Brunsbüttel near Hamburg, Germany. It is owned 67% by Vattenfall and 33% by E.ON. It started operation in 1976 and has a gross power production of 806 MW. As part of the nuclear power phase-out, it was taken out of service in 2007....

. This way they were demonstrating against the plans of the German government to extend the period of producing nuclear power. Demonstrations were also held in other German cities "where public opinion is mainly opposed to nuclear energy".

In September 2010, German government policy shifted back toward nuclear energy, and this generated some new anti-nuclear sentiment in Berlin and beyond. On September 18, 2010, tens of thousands of Germans surrounded Chancellor Angela Merkel

Angela Merkel

’s office in an anti-nuclear demonstration that organisers said was the biggest of its kind since the Chernobyl disaster

Chernobyl disaster

in 1986.

In October 2010, tens of thousands of people protested in Munich against the nuclear power policy of Chancellor Angela Merkel's coalition government. Protesters called for a move away from nuclear power towards renewable energy

Renewable energy

Renewable energy is energy which comes from natural resources such as sunlight, wind, rain, tides, and geothermal heat, which are renewable . About 16% of global final energy consumption comes from renewables, with 10% coming from traditional biomass, which is mainly used for heating, and 3.4% from...

. The action was the biggest anti-nuclear event in Bavaria

Bavaria

Bavaria, formally the Free State of Bavaria is a state of Germany, located in the southeast of Germany. With an area of , it is the largest state by area, forming almost 20% of the total land area of Germany...

for more than two decades.

In November 2010, police wielding batons clashed with protesters who disrupted the passage of a train carrying reprocessed nuclear waste from France to Germany. The train carrying the nuclear waste was heading for Dannenberg where the 123 tonnes of waste was loaded onto trucks and taken to the nearby storage facility of Gorleben, in central Germany. Tens of thousands of protesters gathered in Dannenberg to signal their opposition to the cargo. Organisers said 50,000 people had turned out but police said the figure was closer to 20,000. Around 16,000 police were mobilised to deal with the protests.

Post Fukushima

In light of the Fukushima nuclear disaster, public opposition intensified. 60,000 Germans participated in a protest on 12 March 2011, forming a 45-km human chain from Stuttgart

Stuttgart

Stuttgart is the capital of the state of Baden-Württemberg in southern Germany. The sixth-largest city in Germany, Stuttgart has a population of 600,038 while the metropolitan area has a population of 5.3 million ....

to the Neckarwestheim

Neckarwestheim

Neckarwestheim is a municipality with 3524 inhabitants in the Heilbronn district, Baden-Württemberg, in south-west Germany. It is located on the Neckar river and is well known as the location of a nuclear power station.-Geographical position:...

power plant. 110,000 people protested in 450 other German towns on 14 March, with opinion polls indicating 80% of Germans opposed the government's extension of nuclear power.

On March 15, 2011, Angela Merkel said that seven nuclear power plants which went online before 1980 would be temporarily closed and the time would be used to study speedier renewable energy commercialization

Renewable energy commercialization

. Merkel has effectively suspended a previous decision to keep older nuclear plants operating beyond their previously designated life span.

Former proponents of nuclear energy such as Angela Merkel

Angela Merkel

, Guido Westerwelle

Guido Westerwelle

Guido Westerwelle [] is a German liberal politician, who, since 28 October 2009, has been serving as the Foreign Minister in the second cabinet of Chancellor Angela Merkel, and who was Vice Chancellor of Germany from 2009 to 2011. He is the first openly gay person to hold either of those positions...

, Stefan Mappus

Stefan Mappus

Stefan Mappus is a former German politician from the Christian Democratic Union . He was Minister-President of the state of Baden-Württemberg since 2010 and chairman of the CDU Baden-Württemberg since 2009....

have changed their positions, yet 71% of the population believe that to be a tactical maneuvre related to upcoming state

States of Germany

Germany is made up of sixteen which are partly sovereign constituent states of the Federal Republic of Germany. Land literally translates as "country", and constitutionally speaking, they are constituent countries...

elections. In the largest anti-nuclear demonstration ever held in Germany, some 250,000 people protested on 26 March under the slogan "Fukushima reminds - shut off all nuclear plants." The March 27 state elections in Baden-Württemberg

Baden-Württemberg

Baden-Württemberg is one of the 16 states of Germany. Baden-Württemberg is in the southwestern part of the country to the east of the Upper Rhine, and is the third largest in both area and population of Germany's sixteen states, with an area of and 10.7 million inhabitants...

and Rheinland-Palatinate saw the Greens gain their voting share significantly as a result of their long-time anti-nuclear politics, ending up with the second largest share of the vote in the Baden-Württemberg election.

In March 2011, more than 200,000 people took part in anti-nuclear protests in four large German cities, on the eve of state elections. Organisers called it the biggest anti-nuclear demonstration the country has seen, with police estimating that 100,000 people turned out in Berlin alone. Hamburg, Munich and Cologne also saw big demonstrations. The New York Times reported that "most Germans have a deep-seated aversion to nuclear power, and the damage at the Fukushima Daiichi plant in Japan has galvanized opposition".

Thousands of Germans demanding an end to the use of nuclear power took part in nationwide demonstrations on 2 April 2011. About 7,000 people took part in anti-nuclear protests in Bremen. About 3,000 people protested outside of RWE

RWE

RWE AG , is a German electric power and natural gas public utility company based in Essen. Through its various subsidiaries, the energy company contributes electricity and gas to more than 20 million electricity customers and 10 million gas customers, principally in Europe...

's headquarters in Essen. Other smaller rallies were held elsewhere.

Chancellor Angela Merkel's coalition announced on May 30, 2011, that Germany’s 17 nuclear power stations will be shut down by 2022, in a policy reversal following Japan's Fukushima I nuclear accidents. Seven of the German power stations were closed temporarily in March, and they will remain off-line and be permanently decommissioned. An eighth was already off line, and will stay so.

In November 2011, thousands of anti-nuclear protesters delayed a train carrying radioactive waste from France to Germany. Many clashes and obstructions made the journey the slowest one since the annual shipments of radioactive waste began in 1995. The shipment, the first since Japan's Fukishima nuclear disaster, faced large protests in France where activists damaged the train tracks. Thousands of people in Germany also interrupted the train's journey, forcing it to proceed at a snail's pace, covering 1,200 kilometers (746 miles) in 109 hours. More than 200 people were reported injured in the protests and several arrests were made. Around 160 protesters suffered after being struck by batons or being subjected to tear gas. About 50 security officials had been injured, and 16 police cars damaged, in the deployment. In total, some 20,000 German police have been mobilized.

Timeline

Spiegel Online

Spiegel Online , the online version of German weekly news magazine Der Spiegel, is one the most visited news websites written in the German language.- Company :...

has presented this timeline of events associated with the anti-nuclear power movement in Germany:

1975: Fight about a proposed new nuclear power plant for Whyl.
1976: Clashes between police and protesters at the Brokdorf construction site.
1977: Clashes between anti-nuclear activists and security forces at Brokdorf.
1977: 50,000 people protested against the construction of a fast-breeder reactor at Kalkar in the lower Rhine region.
1979: Following the Three Mile Island accident
Three Mile Island accident
The Three Mile Island accident was a core meltdown in Unit 2 of the Three Mile Island Nuclear Generating Station in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania near Harrisburg, United States in 1979....

, 100,000 people demonstrated against plans for a reprocessing plant at Gorleben
1979: The anti-nuclear movement grows and 150,000 people demonstrated in Bonn, demanding the closure of all nuclear facilities.
1980: 5,000 people occupy the site of the proposed nuclear repository at Gorleben.
1981: Riots in Brokdorf between 10,000 police and 100,000 anti-nuclear protesters.
1984: 4,000 anti-nuclear protesters blocked all access roads to Gorleben for 12 hours.
1986: 100,000 people demonstrated in the Bavarian village of Wackersdorf against a planned reprocessing plant.
1986: After the Chernobyl disaster
Chernobyl disaster
The Chernobyl disaster was a nuclear accident that occurred on 26 April 1986 at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine , which was under the direct jurisdiction of the central authorities in Moscow...

, hundreds of thousands of people demonstrated against nuclear power in various locations.
1995: From the mid-1990s onwards, anti-nuclear protests were primarily directed against transports of radioactive waste called "castor" containers.
1996: Sit-ins against the second castor consignment bringing nuclear waste from La Hague in France to Gorleben.
1997: The third castor transport reached Gorleben despite the efforts of several thousand protesters.
2004: A 21 year old man was killed during protests against the castor transport after a train severed his leg.
2008: 15,000 people protested against the eleventh castor transport.
2009: Tens of thousands demonstrated in Berlin under the motto "Turn Them Off", and called for the decommissioning of all nuclear facilities worldwide.
2010: 120,000 people formed a 120-kilometre long human chain between the nuclear power plants at Krummel and Brunsbuttel, to protest against the federal government's nuclear policy.
2011: Following the Fukushima I nuclear accidents in March, regular quiet demonstrations (Mahnwachen) are held on each Monday in hundreds of places in Germany attracting each time more than 100,000 people. On 26 March, 250,000 people protest against nuclear energy in four cities (Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...

, Cologne
Cologne
Cologne is Germany's fourth-largest city , and is the largest city both in the Germany Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Area, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than ten million inhabitants.Cologne is located on both sides of the...

, Hamburg
Hamburg
-History:The first historic name for the city was, according to Claudius Ptolemy's reports, Treva.But the city takes its modern name, Hamburg, from the first permanent building on the site, a castle whose construction was ordered by the Emperor Charlemagne in AD 808...

and Munich
Munich
Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...

). On 31 May, Chancellor Angela Merkel's coalition government announces a phase-out of Germany's nuclear industry by 2022.

Topics

Brokdorf
Brokdorf
Brokdorf is a municipality in the district of Steinburg, in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany.-Anti Nuclear protests:The Brokdorf Nuclear Power Plant is located in Brokdorf. During the building phase in the 70's and 80's there were violent protests of nuclear power by opponents...
Bund für Umwelt und Naturschutz Deutschland
Bund für Umwelt und Naturschutz Deutschland
Bund für Umwelt und Naturschutz Deutschland is a German non-governmental organisation dedicated to preserving nature and protecting the environment. The german title would be translated to something like Union for the environment and nature conservation Germany...
Free Republic of Wendland
Free Republic of Wendland
The Free Republic of Wendland was a protest camp established in Gorleben, Germany on 3 May 1980 to protest against the establishment of a radioactive waste dump there. On 4 June 1980, the police moved in to evict the camp.- See also :* Anti-nuclear movement in Germany...
Nuclear power in Germany
Nuclear power in Germany
Nuclear power in Germany accounted for 23% of national electricity consumption, before the permanent shutdown of 8 plants in March 2011. German nuclear power began with research reactors in the 1950s and 1960s with the first commercial plant coming online in 1969...
Nuclear power phase-out
Nuclear power phase-out
A nuclear power phase-out is the discontinuation of usage of nuclear power for energy production. Often initiated because of concerns about nuclear power, phase-outs usually include shutting down nuclear power plants and looking towards renewable energy and other fuels.Austria was the first country...
Renewable energy commercialization
Renewable energy commercialization
Renewable energy commercialization involves the deployment of three generations of renewable energy technologies dating back more than 100 years. First-generation technologies, which are already mature and economically competitive, include biomass, hydroelectricity, geothermal power and heat...
Renewable energy in Germany
Renewable energy in Germany
The share of electricity produced from renewable energy in Germany has increased from 6.3 percent of the national total in 2000 to over 20 percent in the first half of 2011. In 2010, investments totaling 26 billion euros were made in Germany’s renewable energies sector...

People

Hildegard Breiner
Hildegard Breiner
Hildegard Breiner is from Vorarlberg, Austria, where she and her late husband led the anti-nuclear campaign against Zwentendorf Nuclear Power Plant in the 1970s. In 1978, an unprecedented 85 percent of the voters in Vorarlberg cast their votes against Zwentendorf, tipping the scales of the...
Hans-Peter Dürr
Hans-Peter Dürr
Hans-Peter Dürr is a German physicist. In addition to nuclear and quantum physics, elementary particles and gravitation, epistemology, and philosophy, he has advocated responsible scientific and energy policies.-Biography:...
Hans-Josef Fell
Hans-Josef Fell
Hans-Josef Fell is a member of the Green Party in the German Parliament. Fell framed the German Renewable Energy legislation, together with Hermann Scheer...
Siegwart Horst Günther
Siegwart Horst Günther
Professor Siegwart Horst Günther once worked with Albert Schweitzer in Africa. He is a prominent proponent of the disputed claim that the use of depleted uranium in munitions causes cancers, birth defects and other pathologies. In 2007 the Nuclear-Free Future Award honored for the third time Prof...
Robert Jungk
Robert Jungk
Robert Jungk , also known as Robert Baum and Robert Baum-Jungk, was an Austrian writer and journalist who wrote mostly on issues relating to nuclear weapons....
André Larivière
André Larivière
André Larivière is an ecologist and anti-nuclear activist from Quebec, Canada. He has lived in Europe since 1986 and was a leading speaker for the French Sortir du nucléaire network...
Claudia Roth
Claudia Roth
Claudia Benedikta Roth is a German Green Party politician and one of the two current party chairs, together with Cem Özdemir.- Biography :...
Rolf Disch
Rolf Disch
Rolf Disch is a German architect, solar energy pioneer and environmental activist who has contributed greatly to the advancement and efficiency of solar architecture internationally...
Hermann Scheer
Hermann Scheer
Hermann Scheer was a Social Democrat member of the German Bundestag , President of Eurosolar and General Chairman of the World Council for Renewable Energy...
Jens Scheer
Jens Scheer
Jens Scheer , was a physicist, professor of nuclear physics at the University of Bremen and one of Germany's best-known anti-nuclear activists.Scheer was member of the Communist Party of Germany party...
Inge Schmitz-Feuerhake
Inge Schmitz-Feuerhake
Born in Osnabrück, Germany on September 28, 1935, Inge Schmitz-Feuerhakes research has assessed the biological effects of ionizing radiation at low dosage levels. From 1973 and until her retirement in 2000 she was a professor in experimental physics at the University of Bremen...
Michael Sladek
Michael Sladek
Michael Sladek is a German doctor and bearer of the Bundesverdienstkreuz.He became famous by realising a grid-independent system for producing electricity, by distributed little power plants....
Ursula Sladek
Ursula Sladek
Ursula Sladek owns a small local power company, Schönau Power Supply, that provides electricity from renewable energy sources to the German electrcity grid...
Klaus Traube
Klaus Traube
Klaus Traube is a German engineer and former manager in the German nuclear power industry and presently one of its leading opponents...
Roland Vogt
Roland Vogt
Roland Vogt is a German politician. He was the first member of the German Green Party to be elected to the Bundestag from Rhineland-Palatinate.Vogt was born in Gelnhausen, Hesse-Nassau. He studied law and political science in Berlin...
Armin Weiss

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